Remote onboarding for Indian teams
Reviewed by Mellow Editorial Team, HR & payroll content team
Remote onboarding for an Indian team follows the same legal obligations as office-based hiring — tax registration, statutory deductions, compliance paperwork — but the logistics of collecting documents, running inductions and setting up payroll must happen without anyone being in the same room.
Get the paperwork right before day one
Before a remote employee's first day, collect the documents you would gather in person: PAN card, Aadhaar, bank account details, previous employer's Form 16 (if applicable), educational certificates and a signed offer letter and employment contract.
For EPF and ESI registration, you need accurate details from day one. EPF contributions are 12% from the employee and 12% from the employer, calculated on basic wages. If the employee's gross wages fall below the applicable threshold, ESI also applies. Missing these at the start creates retrospective correction work that is disproportionately painful.
Under the four consolidated Labour Codes that came into force in 2025, the definition of "wages" has a direct bearing on what counts as the base for statutory deductions. Make sure your offer letter and cost-to-company structure reflects this — particularly how you split basic pay from allowances.
Set up payroll before the salary goes out
Payroll registration cannot wait until the second month. Here is the sequence:
1. Register for TDS deduction under the employer's TAN. You will deduct TDS from salary based on the employee's projected annual income and their chosen tax regime.
2. Collect the employee's tax regime declaration — new regime or old regime. The new regime has slabs rising to 30%, a section 87A rebate for lower incomes and a 4% health and education cess. Without the declaration, you default to the new regime, which may not suit every employee.
3. Register the employee under EPF with the EPFO employer portal and generate their UAN (Universal Account Number) if they do not already have one.
4. Register under ESI if applicable, and ensure contributions are mapped correctly in your payroll software.
5. File Form 24Q quarterly — this is the TDS return for salaries. At the end of the financial year, issue Form 16 to the employee. Remote employees need this to file their own income tax returns, and delays here create friction in the relationship.
Run a structured remote induction
A remote induction that is just a calendar invite and a PDF does not work. Structure it as a sequence spread over the first two weeks.
Week one should cover the essentials the employee needs to be functional: equipment setup, system access, security protocols, payroll portal login, leave management system and introduction to their direct manager and immediate team.
Week two should cover the bigger picture: company strategy, their role in it, key processes, compliance policies (expense reimbursement, working hours, data handling) and introductions to cross-functional contacts.
Assign a specific person — not just "the HR team" — as the new employee's onboarding contact. Remote employees have no corridor to walk down when something is unclear. One named contact removes that ambiguity.
Handle state-specific and location-based compliance
India's labour law compliance is partly state-specific even after the 2025 Labour Codes. Professional tax, for example, is levied at the state level, and rates and slabs vary. If your remote employee is in Maharashtra, Karnataka, West Bengal or another state that levies professional tax, you are responsible for deducting and remitting it, regardless of where your company's registered office sits.
If the employee is in a different state from your head office, confirm whether you need a separate shop and establishment registration in that state. Requirements vary. The general principle is that the location where the employee works is the relevant jurisdiction.
If you are hiring remote employees across multiple geographies, including outside India, how Mellow runs payroll across six countries on one platform covers how multi-jurisdiction payroll can be structured without running separate systems.
Build a remote-first documentation habit
Remote onboarding exposes a gap that office environments paper over: informal knowledge. In an office, a new employee overhears conversations, sees how decisions are made and absorbs culture through proximity. None of that happens remotely.
Compensate deliberately. Before onboarding begins, document the things that are usually unwritten: how leave requests are actually handled, what the escalation path looks like, what "flexible working" means in practice at your company, and how performance is assessed.
Gratuity is payable after five years of continuous service. Employees who join remotely and have no physical connection to an office sometimes underestimate the stability of their employment relationship. Clear, written documentation of benefits — including long-term entitlements like gratuity — builds the trust that the office environment would otherwise create passively.
Remote onboarding done well is not a watered-down version of in-person onboarding. It is a more deliberate, more documented and more structured version of it.
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